Xiongnu Archaeology
Author: Ursula Brosseder
Publisher:
Published: 2011
Total Pages: 653
ISBN-13: 9783936490145
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Handbook of Ancient Afro-Eurasian Economies
Author: Sitta Reden
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Published: 2019-12-02
Total Pages: 954
ISBN-13: 3110604949
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe notion of the “Silk Road” that the German geographer Ferdinand von Richthofen invented in the 19th century has lost attraction to scholars in light of large amounts of new evidence and new approaches. The handbook suggests new conceptual and methodological tools for researching ancient economic exchange in a global perspective with a strong focus on recent debates on the nature of pre-modern empires. The interdisciplinary team of Chinese, Indian and Graeco-Roman historians, archaeologists and anthropologists that has written this handbook compares different forms of economic development in agrarian and steppe regions in a period of accelerated empire formation during 300 BCE and 300 CE. It investigates inter-imperial zones and networks of exchange which were crucial for ancient Eurasian connections. Volume I provides a comparative history of the most important empires forming in Northern Africa, Europe and Asia between 300 BCE and 300 CE. It surveys a wide range of evidence that can be brought to bear on economic development in the these empires, and takes stock of the ways academic traditions have shaped different understandings of economic and imperial development as well as Silk-Road exchange in Russia, China, India and Western Graeco-Roman history.
Handbook of Ancient Afro-Eurasian Economies
Author: Sitta von Reden
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Published: 2023-10-24
Total Pages: 700
ISBN-13: 311060762X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Handbook of Ancient Afro-Eurasian Economies offers in three volumes the first comprehensive discussion of economic development in the empires of the Afro-Eurasian world region to elucidate the conditions under which large quantities of goods and people moved across continents and between empires. Volume 3: Frontier-Zone Processes and Transimperial Exchange analyzes frontier zones as particular landscapes of encounter, economic development, and transimperial network formation. The chapters offer problematizing approaches to frontier zone processes as part of and in between empires, with the goal of better understanding how and why goods and resources moved across the Afro-Eurasian region. Key frontiers in mountains and steppes, along coasts, rivers, and deserts are investigated in depth, demonstrating how local landscapes, politics, and pathways explain network practices and participation in long-distance trade. The chapters seek to retrieve local knowledge ignored in popular Silk Road models and to show the potential of frontier-zone research for understanding the Afro-Eurasian region as a connected space.
Handbook of Ancient Afro-Eurasian Economies
Author: Sitta von Reden
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Published: 2021-12-20
Total Pages: 1131
ISBN-13: 3110604930
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe second volume of the Handbook describes different extractive economies in the world regions that have been outlined in the first volume. A wide range of economic actors – from kings and armies to cities and producers – are discussed within different imperial settings as well as the tools, which enabled and constrained economic outcomes. A central focus are nodes of consumption that are visible in the archaeological and textual records of royal capitals, cities, religious centers, and armies that were stationed, in some cases permanently, in imperial frontier zones. Complementary to the multipolar concentrations of consumption are the fiscal-tributary structures of the empires vis-à-vis other institutions that had the capacity to extract, mobilize, and concentrate resources and wealth. Larger volumes of state-issued coinage in various metals show the new role of coinage in taxation, local economic activities, and social practices, even where textual evidence is absent. Given the overwhelming importance of agriculture, the volume also analyses forms of agrarian development, especially around cities and in imperial frontier zones. Special consideration is given to road- and water-management systems for which there is now sufficient archaeological and documentary evidence to enable cross-disciplinary comparative research.
Archaeology of Asia
Author: Miriam T. Stark
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Published: 2008-04-15
Total Pages: 384
ISBN-13: 1405153032
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis introduction to the archaeology of Asia focuses on casestudies from the region’s last 10,000 years of history. Comprises fifteen chapters by some of the world’sforemost Asia archaeologists Sheds light on the most compelling aspects of Asianarchaeology, from the earliest evidence of plant domestication tothe emergence of states and empires Explores issues of cross-cultural significance, such asmigration, urbanism, and technology Presents original research data that challenges readers tothink beyond national and regional boundaries Synthesizes work previously unavailable to western readers
Archaeology of East Asia
Author: Gina L. Barnes
Publisher: Oxbow Books
Published: 2015-10-31
Total Pages: 432
ISBN-13: 1785700715
DOWNLOAD EBOOKArchaeology of East Asia constitutes an introduction to social and political development from the Palaeolithic to 8th-century early historic times. It takes a regional view across China, Korea, Japan and their peripheries that is unbounded by modern state lines. This viewpoint emphasizes how the region drew on indigenous developments and exterior stimuli to produce agricultural technologies, craft production, political systems, religious outlooks and philosophies that characterize the civilization of historic and even modern East Asia. This book is a complete rewrite and update of The Rise of Civilization in East Asia, first published in 1993. It incorporates the many theoretical, technical and factual advances of the last two decades, including DNA, gender, and isotope studies, AMS radiocarbon dating and extensive excavation results. Readers of that first edition will find the same structure and topic progression. While many line drawings have been retained, new color illustrations abound. Boxes and Appendices clarify and add to the understanding of unfamiliar technologies. For those seeking more detail, the Appendices also provide case studies that take intimate looks at particular data and current research. The book is suitable for general readers, East Asian historians and students, archaeology students and professionals. Praise for The Rise of Civilization in East Asia: “… the best English introduction to the archaeology of East Asia … brilliantly integrates the three areas into a broad regional context.” Prof. Mark Hudson
Handbook of East and Southeast Asian Archaeology
Author: Junko Habu
Publisher: Springer
Published: 2017-12-08
Total Pages: 761
ISBN-13: 1493965212
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Handbook of East and Southeast Asian Archaeology focuses on the material culture and lifeways of the peoples of prehistoric and early historic East and Southeast Asia; their origins, behavior and identities as well as their biological, linguistic and cultural differences and commonalities. Emphasis is placed upon the interpretation of material culture to illuminate and explain social processes and relationships as well as behavior, technology, patterns and mechanisms of long-term change and chronology, in addition to the intellectual history of archaeology as a discipline in this diverse region. The Handbook augments archaeologically-focused chapters contributed by regional scholars by providing histories of research and intellectual traditions, and by maintaining a broadly comparative perspective. Archaeologically-derived data are emphasized with text-based documentary information, provided to complement interpretations of material culture. The Handbook is not restricted to art historical or purely descriptive perspectives; its geographical coverage includes the modern nation-states of China, Mongolia, Far Eastern Russia, North and South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Burma, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and East Timor.
The Archaeology of Early China
Author: Gideon Shelach-Lavi
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2015-01-26
Total Pages: 393
ISBN-13: 0521196892
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis book covers Chinese archaeology from the first people to the unification of the empire, emphasizing cultural variations and interregional contact.
The Art and Archaeology of Bodily Adornment
Author: Sheri Lullo
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2019-07-03
Total Pages: 283
ISBN-13: 1351268309
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Art and Archaeology of Bodily Adornment examines the significance of adornment to the shaping of identity in mortuary contexts within Central and East Asia and brings these perspectives into dialogue with current scholarship in other worldwide regions. Adornment and dress are well-established fields of study for the ancient world, particularly with regard to Europe and the Americas. Often left out of this growing discourse are contributions from scholars of Central and East Asia. The mortuary contexts of focus in this volume represent unique sites and events where identity was visualized, and often manipulated and negotiated, through material objects and their placement on and about the deceased body. The authors examine ornaments, jewelry, clothing, and hairstyles to address questions of identity construction regarding dimensions such as gender and social and political status, and transcultural exchange from burials of prehistoric and early historical archaeological sites in Central Asia, China, Korea, and Japan. In both breadth and depth, this book will be of interest to students and scholars interested in the archaeology, art, and history of Central and East Asia, as well as anyone interested in the general study of dress and adornment.
Nomads as Agents of Cultural Change
Author: Reuven Amitai
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Published: 2014-12-31
Total Pages: 362
ISBN-13: 082484789X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKSince the first millennium BCE, nomads of the Eurasian steppe have played a key role in world history and the development of adjacent sedentary regions, especially China, India, the Middle East, and Eastern and Central Europe. Although their more settled neighbors often saw them as an ongoing threat and imminent danger—“barbarians,” in fact—their impact on sedentary cultures was far more complex than the raiding, pillaging, and devastation with which they have long been associated in the popular imagination. The nomads were also facilitators and catalysts of social, demographic, economic, and cultural change, and nomadic culture had a significant influence on that of sedentary Eurasian civilizations, especially in cases when the nomads conquered and ruled over them. Not simply passive conveyors of ideas, beliefs, technologies, and physical artifacts, nomads were frequently active contributors to the process of cultural exchange and change. Their active choices and initiatives helped set the cultural and intellectual agenda of the lands they ruled and beyond. This volume brings together a distinguished group of scholars from different disciplines and cultural specializations to explore how nomads played the role of “agents of cultural change.” The beginning chapters examine this phenomenon in both east and west Asia in ancient and early medieval times, while the bulk of the book is devoted to the far flung Mongol empire of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. This comparative approach, encompassing both a lengthy time span and a vast region, enables a clearer understanding of the key role that Eurasian pastoral nomads played in the history of the Old World. It conveys a sense of the complex and engaging cultural dynamic that existed between nomads and their agricultural and urban neighbors, and highlights the non-military impact of nomadic culture on Eurasian history. Nomads as Agents of Cultural Change illuminates and complicates nomadic roles as active promoters of cultural exchange within a vast and varied region. It makes available important original scholarship on the new turn in the study of the Mongol empire and on relations between the nomadic and sedentary worlds.
